Fiction Paradise

Blog Tour Book Review: Wicked Saints

This is a spoiler free review of Wicked Saints by Emily A. Duncan. This book was one of those books I know I’m going to be talking nonstop about. It was that good. It was dark, beautiful, immersive, and wow, I truly adored this book! The characters, setting, and the plot had me pulled in from the start.

Thank you so much to Wednesday Books for inviting to have a spot on this blog tour! They have graciously provided me with an ARC copy of the novel. All thoughts and opinions are my own!

About the Book

A girl who can speak to gods must save her people without destroying herself.

A prince in danger must decide who to trust.

A boy with a monstrous secret waits in the wings.

Together, they must assassinate the king and stop the war.

In a centuries-long war where beauty and brutality meet, their three paths entwine in a shadowy world of spilled blood an mysterious saints, where a forbidden romance threatens to tip the scales between dark and light. Wicked Saints is the thrilling start to Emily A. Duncan’s devastatingly Gothic Something Dark and Holy trilogy.

Pronunciation Guide:

If you find yourself having trouble figuring out how to pronounce some of the awesome characters and locations within this book, here’s a handy guide to help!

About the Author

EMILY A. DUNCAN works as a youth services librarian. She received a Master’s degree in library science from Kent State University, which mostly taught her how to find obscure Slavic folklore texts through interlibrary loan systems. When not reading or writing, she enjoys playing copious amounts of video games and dungeons and dragons. Wicked Saints is her first book. She lives in Ohio.

My Review

This book. Oh my goodness, THIS BOOK. It’s been one of my most anticipated reads for 2019, and when I was invited to the blog tour I about lost it. I am so thankful I was given an opportunity to be on the tour, because this book was such a joy to read and will be going down as one of my favorite reads of all time!

The characters immediately pulled me in. I’ll admit it’s usually a bit difficult for me to get into stories with multiple points-of-views, but I had no such problem with Wicked Saints! I was sucked in by Nadya and Serefin’s voices. They were both delightful to read from, and their stories had me flipping the pages (well, scrolling through my Kindle) until my eyes could stay open no longer! I am absolutely obsessed with the whole cast of characters. Each of them felt real, and I was desperate to know more about each of them. I was not disappointed!

Ostyia, Kacper, Parijahan, Rashid, and Malachiasz will always have a special place in my heart. The interactions between both sides, Nadya with Parijahan, Rashid, and Malachiasz and Serefin with Ostyia and Kacper, was excellent to read. This cast was unforgettable. And this wasn’t even the full cast. There were other equally as wonderful characters, too!

I am absolutely obsessed with the setting and the monsters. This book completely immersed me in the narration. I felt like I was there. While I was reading, the rest of the world disappeared. The monsters were excellent, too. The Vultures were so interesting to read about. During their first appearance I was both amazed and terrified of them!

The constant struggle between what is good, what we’re told is good, and what could be good, was awesome. I especially loved seeing the dynamic between Nadya and Malachiasz. She’s been devoted to the gods her and entire life, and she views Malachiasz as a blood mage heretic. Unravelling the different nuances between the way they practice magic was fantastic as well as how they could maybe work together. The moral ambiguity was delightful and so much fun to read.

I could probably ramble on and on about how much I absolutely adored this book. It had everything I look for in my favorite books: enemies, moral ambiguity, a hint of blood (okay, more than a hint), and so much more. Did I mention yet there’s blood and chin grabbing? No? Well, yeah, there is, and you need to read this immediately.

I’m serious. Please read it. I need to cry to someone about how much I loved this!

Also, another side note, this book is a totally awesome aesthetic. That cover? Wow, I’m obsessed (if you couldn’t tell yet).

Have you read Wicked Saints yet? Are you going to? What are your thoughts?!

[…] Wicked Saints is most definitely going down as one of my favorite books of all time. It’s incredibly immersive and the storytelling is spectacular! You can take a look at my review of the book here. […]

Congrats on the blog tour! I am not sure of what I should do here so I apologize… I put my comment on Twitter when it was tweeted out as blog of the day. I also followed you here and there (and almost just broke out into a Beatles song)!